As part of the conference this year we will be running a panel on funding opportunities for start-ups ( see also our stARtup page for opportunities for free demo space ). Among the leading players in the funding space here is Barry Downes.

Barry is the Managing Partner of the Suir Valley Ventures, which is a venture capital fund that invests in early stage start-ups powered by deep technology in the Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) sector, in Financial Technologies (FinTech) and also in the Internet of Things (IoT) sector. Suir Valley Ventures is part of the Shard Capital Partners group, which is a London-based independent financial services company offering a full range of broking, asset management and corporate capital services. Shard Capital meets the diverse needs of companies and investors by leading the way in navigating the new world of globalfinance. Barry is also the Chairman of the Telecommunications Software and Systems Group (TSSG www.tssg.org) a leading international software Research Institute that specialises in AR/VR, AI and communications technologies research and development (R&D). Previously Barry was CEO of TSSG and also the Centre Director of the Mobile Services Technology Gateway (MSTG), a close to market R&D Centre that delivers advanced mobile and AR/VR technologies and solutions to leading international technology companies. Over the last three years MSTG has worked with over 110 companies based to help them with mobile and AR/VR R&D innovation.Barry also founded FeedHenry Ltd. a leading cloud-based mobile applications platform based in Waterford, Ireland and Boston, Massachusetts. Red Hat Inc (NYSE: RHT) acquired FeedHenry for $82 million in October 2014. Barry is also currently a Member of the Board of ImmersiveVREducation Ltd. which develops the award-winning Apollo 11 virtual reality (VR) experience and Barry is also an Executive Producer of Apollo 11 VR .Barry has worked extensively in Silicon Valley as a Partner of SVG Partners, a San Francisco based investment and advisory firm that helps its clients with innovation, strategy and technology consulting. In this capacity Barry has worked with a number of San Francisco based firms including Lookout Inc. a global mobile security products company.
Prior to joining TSSG Barry was the Vice President of Software Services for Waterford Technologies a leading provider of cloud archiving tools, headquartered Waterford, Ireland and in Orange County, California.Education
Barry holds a BSc. in Applied Computing from the Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT) and a 1.1 M.B.A. from the Michael Smurfit Graduate School of Business at University College Dublin (UCD). Barry also holds executive education qualifications from Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Haas Business School at the University of California Berkeley and Henley Business School in the UK.Current Activities / Research Interests
Barry’s current research interests include augmented reality and virtual reality (AR/VR) technologies and also new types of FinTech technologies in the areas of credit and lending, digital currencies and blockchain, mobile and digital banking and new models for Foreign Exchange.
web:www.SuirValleyVentures.comwww.shardcapital.com/www.tssg.org